Dancing with Myself: Model of Professional Identity Development via Intrapersonal Vicarious Learning

Abstract

In this paper, we introduce a process model of professional identity development through intrapersonal vicarious learning. Building on an ethnography of working professionals in Milan, Italy who also perform as drag queens, we describe how an individual’s Alter Ego or Secondary Self can facilitate the exploration of desirable professional identity attributes that are then transferred to their Primary Work Self. Central to this process is the adoption of a cognitive attitude of compartmentalization. Rather than seeing their Alter Ego as a side of their Primary Self, these individuals see it instead as a separate, Second Self. This subjective perception of separateness reduces and postpones pressures to make sense of, find consistency in, or integrate the Second Self’s thoughts, behaviors, and self-conceptions vis-a-vis the Primary Self. In turn, this reduced pressure for coherence and integration grants the individual more freedom to explore a variety of experiences, behaviors, and interpretations that may otherwise be avoided or curtailed were they immediately seen as needing to correspond to, or be incorporated into, the Primary Self. Once these novel identity attributes emerge and develop, our process model describes how they are ultimately modified and transferred to the Primary Self through a process we refer to as intrapersonal vicarious learning.